A MARRIED mum-of-three teenagers is longing to be with her illicit lover and cannot wait to have an affair now hotels have reopened.
Sylvia Turner*, who has been married to Martin* for 16 years, began an affair with Tom*, 50, an IT consultant, after meeting him at a conference in Dubai in 2013 and she has been seeing him for the past eight years.
However, with lockdown meaning overnight hotel stays were she has found the last year a struggle as hasn’t experienced much romance with her husband.
She says: “It’s hardly surprising, then, that I am literally counting down the days until the hotels finally reopen next week — by which time it will have been 16 long months since I last saw Tom, an IT consultant who lives 300 miles from me and, at 50, is six years my senior.
“Lockdown has been cruel to people like us with unsuspecting husbands, wives, and children at home.
“We are wholly reliant on anonymous hotels to steal precious evenings and weekends together.
“It’s a wonder I haven’t gone crazy, cooped up at home with my husband of 16 years, whose best shot at romance these days is occasionally remembering to put petrol in the car and a son and two daughters so attached to their phones I can’t remember the last time they looked me in the eye.
“And even though she has no desire for her children to grow up as victims of divorce, she says getting together with her lover again will help her from going “crazy” as she is “entitled to some happiness too.”
As a married mum, Sylvia is constantly cooking, cleaning and chauffeuring which makes her long for to be carefree.
She says: “For years, the prospect of my hotel trysts with Tom every few months were the one ‘carrot’ getting me through the day-to-day drudgery of domestic life.
“My most precious memory is from the spa in London’s Mandarin Oriental Hotel, one of our favourite haunts — and a world away from my suburban existence.
“Thanks to Tom’s work sometimes picking up the bill, we stay in grand hotels — sometimes we get upgraded to a suite, which would cost thousands of pounds a night.”
I'm not guilty about my double life
While her husband Martin hasn’t brought her flowers, Tom has always made sure there is a bouquet of roses for her in the room.
She says: “It will come as no surprise to learn that, as in many long-term relationships, there is a lot of unresolved hurt and bubbling resentment in my marriage and that’s the reason I feel little guilt, or remorse, for having led this double life for eight years.
“I have no desire for my children to grow up as victims of divorce, to lose their home and comfortable lifestyle, so I have no plans to leave my husband, but I think I am entitled to some happiness too.
“Difficult though it may be for some to understand, while I wouldn’t go as far as to say it’s an act of revenge, I do feel my affair is justified.”
Sylvia says she has become an expert at keeping it a secret and will simply “detach” away from any situation.
I feel cherished and special
She says: “It wasn’t always this bad, of course.
“For several years I tried to improve our relationship, suggesting couples’ counselling, but Martin, who is quite old-fahioned, wouldn’t hear of such ‘navel-gazing’.
“Then along came Tom, who never tires of telling me how beautiful and clever I am and makes me feel cherished and special.”
In the coming months, once travelling abroad get the green light, Sylvia and Tom plan to go on holiday to celebrate his 50th.
She says: “We have a five-star London hotel booked for next week.
“As my client meetings haven’t really got off the ground yet, I can’t use my usual excuse, so my husband thinks I’m meeting up with girlfriends I’ve known since university whom he’s never likely to bump into.
“So come next Friday, I shall be off, suitcase in hand and a huge grin on my face, all too ready to swap languishing in lockdown for sensuous suite living, once again. I simply cannot wait.”
Names and some details have been changed to protect identity. Sylvia Turner is a pseudonym. Interview by Helen Carroll.
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